Stories of courage from October 7, to read with children. Story one.

In the town of Ofakim, in southern Israel, lived a grandmother named Rachel Edri. She was 65. She lived in a small ground-floor apartment with her husband, David. They had been married for many years. Their children were grown, and the grandchildren came to visit on Shabbat and on holidays. Every time they came, Savta Rachel had something ready for them to eat. That was who she was. Nobody left her house hungry.

Saturday, October 7, 2023, was Simchat Torah in Israel. Early in the morning, before the sun was fully up, the sirens began. Rockets were falling on southern Israel. Rachel and David had heard sirens many times in their lives. They did what they always did and waited for it to pass.

But this time the sirens did not stop. Then came another sound. Gunfire. In the street. Close to the house.

Rachel looked out the window. Armed men were running through the streets of Ofakim. They were not Israeli soldiers. They were terrorists who had broken through the Gaza fence and driven all the way to Ofakim. Some were running toward her building.

Someone pounded on the door. A voice shouted in Hebrew: “Police! Open the door!”

David opened it. It was not the police.

Five men pushed their way in. They had rifles and grenades. They were shouting. They shut the door behind them. Rachel and David were now prisoners in their own home.

Rachel’s heart was pounding. She was sure these were the last minutes of her life. But in the middle of the fear, an idea came to her, clear and simple: These men are on edge. They are shouting, they are scared, and they might shoot. If I can calm them down, maybe, just maybe, with God’s help, David and I will survive. I need to keep them busy until our army comes to rescue us.

So Savta Rachel did something no one would expect at a moment like that, something she had done countless times with her guests. She did what she did best. She looked at the five terrorists standing in her living room and asked if they would like something to drink.

They stared at her. Then one of them said yes.

She went to the kitchen and brought water and Coca-Cola. She made coffee. She took out a plate of the cookies she had baked before the holiday and set it on the table. “Eat,” she told them. “You must be hungry.”

They ate.

Rachel sat down with them. She talked. She asked where they were from. She told them about her family. When one of them pointed his rifle at her, she calmly asked him to lower it. It made her nervous, she said, and she couldn’t serve coffee properly with a gun in her face. He lowered it.

Rachel knew a few Arabic songs from her childhood. She sang them. The men listened. One even sang along. Rachel smiled. Inside, she was terrified. But she never let it show. Not for a second.

Outside, the street had filled with police and soldiers. They surrounded the building. Among the police was a young officer named Evyatar Edri. He was Rachel’s son! He knew his parents were inside with five terrorists. He knew every room in that apartment, every door, every window. He drew the whole layout for the commanders of the special unit, so they would know exactly where to go when the time came.

The hours passed, and night fell. Rachel kept making coffee. She kept bringing cookies. She kept talking. At one point, when the terrorists weren’t looking, she raised her hand near the window and held up five fingers, so the police outside would know how many men were inside. They saw. They understood.

The terrorists grew tired. Rachel did not. Or if she did, nobody noticed.

At 2:30 in the morning, the police special unit stormed the apartment. It was over in seconds. Rachel and David, Baruch HaShem, walked out unharmed, straight into their son’s arms.

When the story got out in Israel, people could hardly believe it. A grandmother with a plate of cookies had held off five armed men for hours and saved her own life and her husband’s. Reporters asked her how she did it. Rachel shrugged. “I gave them cookies,” she said. “What else could I do?”

But everyone understood what she had really done. When fear filled the house, she did not freeze or panic. She thought. She stayed calm so the others would stay calm. She looked for every chance to help the people coming to save her. And never, not for one moment, did she stop believing they would come.

הוֹד֣וּ לַה֣׳ כִּי־ט֑וֹב כִּ֖י לְעוֹלָ֣ם חַסְדּֽוֹ

Based on information from @YBCisrael.

Only now, after the Omani terrorist’s confession, are we beginning to understand the size of the tragedy that, thank God, did not happen.

To appreciate the miracle and the Divine intervention that saved us, I ask you to come with me for a moment to a very dark place. It is the scenario that, according to Israel’s security services, should have happened.

Close your eyes and picture this. A routine Flydubai flight is on approach to Ben Gurion Airport. Since the plane left the United Arab Emirates, everything has looked perfectly normal on the radar screens in Dubai. Inside the plane, too, nobody notices anything unusual. It is an ordinary, uneventful flight. But in the locked cockpit only one pilot is flying the plane: the co-pilot, Hamam al-Hammami, an Omani terrorist. A few minutes earlier he murdered the captain, Smit Machchhar, who now lies on the floor, dead and covered in blood.

The terrorist killed him with the axe kept in the cockpit for emergencies, when a window or the cabin wall has to be broken from the inside. Hamam got up from his seat and told the captain he was going to pray. When the captain looked away, Hamam attacked him from behind, struck him on the head with the axe and pushed him away from the controls. Nobody heard anything unusual from the cockpit, whose door, for security reasons, must remain fully closed. Neither the crew nor the passengers noticed anything strange or realized what was happening.

With the captain out of the way, the terrorist took the controls and flew calmly toward his target: Ben Gurion Airport. There was no panic and no warning sign, not inside the plane and not to the control towers, because Captain Smit Machchhar had no time to react or to trigger any alarm.

Terminal 3 at Tel Aviv’s airport is packed. It is Chol HaMoed Sukkot, and the airport is full of travelers arriving in Israel and leaving it. According to Israel Hayom, about 100,000 people pass through the airport each day at this time of year. At any given moment, an estimated 15,000 to 20,000 people, travelers and workers, are inside the Ben Gurion terminal.

As he approaches Ben Gurion, the suicide terrorist carries out the operation he spent years preparing for: crashing the plane into the passenger terminal. In true 9/11 style, a plane full of Israeli passengers will be used as a weapon.

This would have been Israel’s 9/11, only many times worse. We were saved. By the heroism of Captain Smit and by a chain of miracles, with Israeli heroes and one Divine hero. Bore Olam stepped in to save us from a tragedy whose proportions we are only now beginning to grasp.

In the middle of Sukkot, days before Simchat Torah, three years after October 7, we would be in mourning, facing, God forbid, thousands dead and tens of thousands wounded in Medinat Israel.

We must thank God for saving us and ask Him to please keep being with us.

That is what we did these days of Sukkot, when we repeated several times in the Hallel the extended biblical formula for thanking God. In this case it carries even more meaning than “Baruch HaShem.” King David coined it to thank God in Hebrew: Hodu la-A-donai ki tov, ki le’olam chasdo! “Let us thank God because we are well [safe], and may His kindness toward us [the people of Israel] last forever.”

With these words we do not only thank God because we are safe. We also ask Him, and declare with Jewish optimism, that He will keep being with us, protecting us from our enemies.

On Wednesday, September 30, Flydubai flight FZ1073 left Dubai for Tel Aviv with 174 passengers on board, 166 of them Israeli. About two and a half hours after takeoff, with the Boeing 737 MAX cruising at around 34,000 feet, the co-pilot attacked the captain, Smit Machchhar, an Indian national, with a knife. The co-pilot is a terrorist of Omani origin and is now under investigation in Saudi Arabia. Some speculate that he meant to crash the plane, 9/11 style, into an Israeli city. Israeli journalist Guy Bechor says the target was an American air base in Saudi Arabia, home to US military personnel and several F-35s, considered the most advanced fighter jets in the world. That would have served two goals at once: killing Israelis (the Little Satan) and Americans (the Great Satan).

There is little doubt the plan came from Iran (see here). President Trump has said as much, but the connection has not yet been officially confirmed. What is not in doubt is that this was a terror attack in midair. But up there, in the sky, miracles happened too.

THIS IS THE STORY

Here is the sequence of events as we know it so far, based mostly on the accounts of the Israelis who were on the plane.

First, the terrorist, whose name has not yet been officially released and who, according to Prime Minister Netanyahu, “received Islamist indoctrination,” locked the cockpit door so no one could get in and he could take over the plane. He stabbed the pilot, Smit Machchhar, took the controls and turned the plane toward a high-value target to crash it. But Smit survived. Miraculously, while the terrorist was flying the plane, he found the strength and the presence of mind to open the cockpit door.

At that moment a passenger, Tzvika Manes (or his wife), was taking their little daughter to the bathroom and noticed that the cockpit door was half open and the pilot’s seat was empty. He alerted the other passengers. One of them, Yaniv Hayun, an Israeli plumber, went to see what was going on. Yaniv got into the cockpit and saw the wounded pilot. When the terrorist co-pilot saw Yaniv and realized the door was open, he began trying to wreck the controls so the plane would go down wherever it fell and, at the very least, kill everyone on board.

Hayun put him in a chokehold and, with the help of two other passengers, Tzvika and Assaf Arjuan, pulled him away from the controls. The fight was violent and the terrorist kept resisting, so they had to improvise. They tied his hands and legs with the plane’s headphone cords. There was nothing else at hand.

Meanwhile, with no one at the controls and the autopilot off, the plane went into a nosedive. The danger was not only that it would hit the ground. The enormous G-forces and the speed of the fall could have torn the fuselage apart or ripped off a wing in midair. In fact, that is what should have happened. The plane was dropping at about 30,000 feet per minute. According to a US military pilot who flies C-17s, aircraft far sturdier than any airliner, the breakup limit is 20,000 feet per minute.

During the fall the plane reached a ground speed of around 600 knots, close to the speed of sound. The Boeing 737’s maximum is 340. In every known case where a commercial plane came near those speeds, the tail broke off, the rear of the aircraft was destroyed, and everyone on board died. This may have been the greatest miracle of all.

As the plane plunged, Yaniv Hayun sat down at the controls. He was not a pilot. But not long before, miraculously, he had watched a documentary series, Air Crash Investigation (in Hebrew, Te’ufa BeChakira), and that bit of familiarity told him what to do: pull back on the yoke to level the plane and regain altitude. He did it just seconds before the plane would have gone into an unrecoverable dive.

One problem remained. Who would fly the plane and land it? The heroic pilot was badly wounded. A dentist on board, Dr. Shota Musaev, was treating him and managed to stop the bleeding, but the captain was in no condition to fly.

Miraculously, two off-duty Flydubai pilots were on the same flight as passengers, on their way to operate another flight. Thank God, one of them took the controls and steered the Boeing to the nearest airport, Tabuk, in Saudi Arabia, where it landed.

B”H no passenger and no crew member died. All 174 people on board, 166 of them Israeli, came out alive.

SEPTEMBER 30 AND OCTOBER 7

There is one more thing I think we need to stress. That instinct, the refusal to sit and wait for the problem to solve itself, the urge to run toward danger when lives are at stake instead of waiting for someone else to act, is one of the main reasons our people, Am Israel, survives, and thrives, in the State of Israel. Most people in the modern West behave like bystanders. The Israeli Jew is trained to step in when the stakes are high. The Israelis on that plane did not wait for the crew to come save them. They walked straight into the lion’s den. It is impossible not to compare what happened on this plane with what happened on October 7. When, for reasons that are still hard to understand, the army failed, the air force failed, and the security systems failed, thousands of Israelis risked their lives, and many lost them, to stop the Hamas invasion. Without them, without those who acted on the Jewish instinct for survival, the invasion would likely have spread much further and the death toll could have been even higher. When lives are in danger, the Israeli, who in most cases has gone through excellent army training, is ready, mentally and physically, to act and save lives. Today I heard that several people have posted something on social media that struck me as very telling: “On every flight I take, I’ll make sure there are at least one or two Israelis on board. That way I’ll feel safer.”

HEROES IN THE SKY

We tend to think of miracles as events in which the laws of nature stop working. But many biblical miracles are not like that. Human beings act in a completely natural way, and then the Creator performs the miracle. Nachshon walks into the sea, and God splits it. Shimshon fights the Philistines, and God helps him. Elisha tries to save a child’s life, and God brings the boy back from certain death.

Every miracle that happened on this flight began with a human act. God’s intervention shows itself in full when we look at the whole sequence. Then we realize that on the Flydubai flight, human forces and the Forces of Heaven worked together perfectly.

By Guy Bechor, www.gplanet.co.il

What lies behind the attempt to crash an entire Emirati plane full of Israelis? Behind the scenes of a regime […] there are precise Iranian messages. What are they? Did the Iranians want a “mafia-style” hit? How to read the messages: did they mean to crash the plane? Careful! A war that topples the regime? And what did the philosopher Seneca say?

Behind an Omani pilot’s attempt to bring down the Flydubai passenger plane over Saudi territory there are clear Iranian messages. They are aimed mainly at Israel […] and at the United States. And they are messages of dangerous desperation.

“If there are no flights to Iran, then no one flies.” That is the line Iranian spokesmen have been repeating for several days. The near-total air boycott of passengers flying to and from Iran has paralyzed […]. It hurts a lot, and it is dangerous for the regime.

This month the United States imposed sweeping sanctions on Iran’s entire aviation sector, a true “economic isolation.” All Iranian airlines were added to the list of terrorist organizations. Foreign companies were barred from selling them fuel, landing services or tickets, on pain of being cut off from the dollar system.

The result is severe isolation in the air. The Emirates, Oman, Iraq and other countries [have joined the boycott], and Iran has responded by threatening the airports that comply. Russia, Turkey and Pakistan still operate Iranian flights, but the global isolation is closing in.

Oddly, the economic sanctions hurt less than people say. In videos from Tehran posted on YouTube in recent days, there is no sign of special pressure on the streets.

In response, Iran is already striking Saudi airports through its proxy groups, including the main airports in Riyadh and Jeddah. But it does not dare attack Ben Gurion Airport, because it fears Israel would use that as a pretext for a war of annihilation that brings down the regime. So it found another solution: [an attack on] Israelis, with no signature. Something that falls short of opening a war against the regime.

The dramatic meeting in the Emirates

The Emirates’ public announcement about […] hit Tehran hard. The official visit included […] of Israel and his wife, along with an Israeli wartime security team. Senior officials from other Arab countries were reportedly there too, and an agreement was reached […] against Iran when the war resumes.

And that is not all. The Tehran regime sees this as [an alliance under] Israeli [leadership], instead of the Gulf states surrendering to Tehran. The Americans are leaving, and today they evacuated all […] Iraq. The Kurds, as always, […]. Iran, Turkey and Israel are competing over who will lead the Arabs. This mysterious visit showed Iran that Israel is in the picture, and in a big way.

So this is a warning to the Emirates: if they keep up their military coordination with Israel, they will be hit […] three times over. Today it was an attempt to bring down an Emirati plane, with Israelis on board, over Saudi territory. And everyone in the Middle East understands who sent this message.

Above: the terror flight of the Israelis over Saudi territory, who had to endure this Iranian horror.

More broadly, the Abraham Accords created a reality Iran cannot tolerate. Israelis fly to Dubai and are welcomed warmly. There is tourism, business, open normalization and public agreements, including cooperation on joint defensive fortification (against suicide boats, for example).

Every tourist flight like this one, to Israel, shows Iran that the Shiite axis has failed to stop [normalization]. The central aim of October 7 was to stop normalization with Israel. So today’s attack was meant to bring fear back to the skies, shake passengers’ confidence and pressure the Emirates to back off.

There is a straight line from the October 7 mega-attack to today’s attempted air attack. In both cases Iran wanted to stop normalization.

Iran has attacked Gulf airspace before. But this time it used […] an insider. That lets it say, “We can reach anywhere,” in a softer way, [without paying] the price of a direct clash with Israel or the United States.

Did they want to destroy the plane?

Did the Tehran regime want to destroy the plane, or only to stage a major attack without […] fatal? There are two possibilities. Either the pilot was an amateur, which does not seem likely in an Iranian operation that needed to be precise, or he was told not to go all the way.

The big [question] is the cockpit. Since 9/11, the modern cockpit door locks automatically and is armored. [It cannot be opened] from outside, except with an emergency code that starts a 30-to-60-second timer. Had the terrorist pilot locked it and pressed the “Deny” switch, blocking entry completely, the passengers probably would not have gotten in in time, and the plane [would have crashed].

[There are other explanations:] the door may not have been fully locked during the struggle between the pilots, the captain may have managed to keep it accessible, or the attacker may have been too busy stabbing and putting the plane into a dive to block the entrance. The passengers heard screams, or the door opened; they went in, subdued the terrorist and pulled him out. Then they locked the door themselves.

In an attack like this, locking the cockpit is the first and essential task. That it was not done is strange. To be clear, we are not trying to defend the Tehran regime, only to understand the reasons behind the message it sent with this attack.

Does the regime want war?

Iran does not want an all-out war right now, because it knows that this time the regime could fall. A direct war would expose its weaknesses: [lack of] internal calm and the earlier blows to its military facilities. It prefers warning shots, deterrence, attrition and limited […] intimidation, which sow doubt about air safety and make the Gulf states ask whether [the alliance with Israel] is worth the risk. The same goes for Saudi Arabia.

The goal is not to bring down a plane. The goal is to make Israelis, Israel and its partners think twice before boarding a flight, attacking Iran or normalizing relations. The question is not how many people died, but how many panicked or changed [their plans].

This is the classic Iranian style: a bloody warning. An attack like this shows nervousness and worry in the Tehran regime, to the point of being willing to take dangerous action, [close to] crossing the big red line.

The question now is how Jerusalem and Washington will respond to these bloody messages. Before the midterm elections, going back to an intense war is not convenient right now, and the Iranians know it. That is the timing, the reason they chose this exact moment. The more serious the threat of toppling the regime becomes, the stronger and more dangerous [their messages] will be, and we need to be ready for that.

And Seneca, the Roman philosopher, said: Nullus perniciosior hostis est quam quem audacem angustiae faciunt. That is: “No enemy is more dangerous than one whom desperation has made bold.”

Zionism= The return of the Jewish people to the land of Israel to found there a Jewish State.

Many people today — friends and enemies of Israel alike — think that Zionism is a modern, secular, European invention. In this article I want to show that the idea of Zionism is much older than its name: it is written in the Torah itself, and it has a Biblical name: Teshuvah.

This Shabbat we read Parashat Nitsavim, and in it one of the most extraordinary chapters of the Torah: Debarim (Deuteronomy) chapter 30, known as “Parashat haTeshuvah,” the section of the Return. In these few verses the concept of Teshuvah — literally, “return” — is mentioned eight times. And here comes the surprise: the Teshuvah of this chapter is not the Teshuvah most of us have in mind.

When we hear the word “Teshuvah” we think of personal repentance: regretting our mistakes, confessing them and abandoning them. But that is not the peshat, the plain meaning, of our parashah. For Maimonides, personal repentance is the mitsvah of Vidui, confession, and its corresponding pasuk is in the book of Bemidbar: “and they shall confess the sin they have committed” (Bemidbar 5:7). In Debarim 30 the Torah is speaking about a different Teshuvah. Listen to the text itself: “Then HaShem your God will return your captivity and have mercy on you, and He will return and gather you from all the nations where HaShem your God has scattered you. Even if your dispersed are at the end of the heavens, from there HaShem your God will gather you, and from there He will take you” (Debarim 30:3–4).

The primary meaning of Teshuvah in the Torah is the return of the Jewish people to its land, after a long exile in the farthest corners of the world. The chapter describes a process: first a collective repentance, then a national reconciliation with HaShem, and then Teshuvah defines the way HaShem will “return” the Jewish people to their land. Just as the exile in the previous chapter (Debarim 29) was the result of the Jews abandoning HaShem, the return to the land of Israel is presented as the result of the reconciliation between Am Israel and HaShem, our God.

Now, this reading of Parashat haTeshuvah is not a modern invention created to justify Zionism. It is the opposite: modern Zionism was born from this reading. Let me introduce you to the man who saw it first.

While the term “Zionism” was coined by Nathan Birnbaum in 1890, Rabbi Yehuda Bibas (1776–1852) should be credited with the idea of modern Zionism. Rabbi Bibas was born in Gibraltar (an English colony). From his mother’s side, he was the grandson of the famous Moroccan rabbi Rabbenu Hayim ben Attar, the Or-haHayim-haQadosh (1696–1743), author of one of the classic commentaries on the Torah. His father belonged to the prestigious Bibas family of Tetuan, Spanish Morocco — a family of Rabbanim (rabbis), Dayanim (rabbinical judges) and Shohatim (ritual slaughterers). Rabbi Bibas was for many years the rabbi of the prominent and affluent Jewish community of Corfu, a beautiful island that today belongs to Greece.

Rabbi Bibas saw the opportunity for the Jewish people to have their own state in the fact that many countries in those years (1820–1835) revolted against the ruling empires and thus gained their independence. Living in Corfu allowed Rabbi Bibas the privileged perspective of being a direct witness to the revolution of the Greeks against the Ottoman Empire and the victory that led to the creation of the independent Greek State. Israel, then called “Palestine,” was also under the rule of the Ottoman Empire. Rabbi Bibas estimated in 1835 that the Jews were able to gain their own independence, as the Ottoman Empire was increasingly weak politically and militarily. Rabbi Yehuda Bibas opined: “The Jews must conquer the land of Israel militarily from the Turks, just as the Greeks conquered their own land from the Turks.”

Rabbi Bibas traveled through Europe and North Africa, visiting Turkey, the Balkans, Vienna, London, Germany, Hungary, Prague and many more Jewish communities. And the main message he preached to all the Jews of the world was one word: “TESHUVAH” — a call to return as a Nation to the land of Israel and to found there a Jewish State. Rabbi Bibas was not giving the word a new meaning. He was recovering its first meaning, the meaning of Parashat Nitsavim.

Rabbi Bibas explained that by dwelling in the Diaspora: “We are turning our backs on HaShem (the opposite of ‘teshuvah,’ i.e., ‘facing’ HaShem. YB), as our rabbis explained: A Jew living outside Israel is like a Jew without God. And why are we living in exile? In order to seek our sustenance? Did not the Torah say that the land of Israel is a land that HaShem constantly monitors, a land in which bread will not be eaten with poverty, is it not a land that will not lack anything? Day after day, when eating a meal with bread, we thank HaShem for the land of abundance, Israel, that He has granted us…”

And Rabbi Bibas did not only preach Teshuvah: he lived it. At the end of his life he left his position and his community, went up to the land of Israel, and settled in Hebron, the city of our Patriarchs, where he passed away in 1852. He returned.

Rabbi Yehuda Alqalay (1798–1878) brought the ideas of Rabbi Yehuda Bibas to writing. Unlike Rabbi Bibas, who did not get to publish his ideas (or his books did not reach us, or were not spread…), Rabbi Alqalay was a prolific writer. Like Rabbi Bibas, Rab Alqalay did not conceive the return of the people of Israel to their land as a solution to the eternal problem of anti-Semitism, but essentially as a way of fulfilling the Jewish aspiration for political normalization: that is, the Jewish people, living in its land, Israel, ruled by its law, the Torah. Both rabbis understood that the people of Israel did not need to wait passively for the arrival of the Mashiah to realize this aspiration. Rather, we should actively seek the re-establishment of an independent Jewish State in the land of our ancestors as a way of advancing and facilitating the arrival of the Mashiah.

Rabbi Alqalay, inspired by Rabbi Bibas, formulated his plan and ideas for the restoration of the Jews in Israel in his book “Goral laHaShem,” published in Vienna in 1857. In this book Rabbi Alqalay designed a comprehensive plan with the religious foundations and the practical steps to bring to fruition a national “TESHUVAH”: the return of the Jewish nation to Israel. The book was published in three different editions and translated into many languages, including English.

And here history gives us a beautiful final detail. For decades Rabbi Alqalay served as the rabbi of Zemun, a small city near Belgrade. Among the members of his community was a Jew named Simon Loeb Herzl — the grandfather of Theodor Herzl. The ideas that the world would later know as “Herzl’s Zionism” were heard, a generation earlier, in the synagogue of a Sephardic rabbi. Rabbi Alqalay, like his teacher Rabbi Bibas, ended his days in the land of Israel: he settled in Jerusalem in 1874 and passed away there in 1878.

We read Parashat Nitsavim every year on the Shabbat before Rosh Hashanah, in the middle of the season of Teshuvah, when every Jew is occupied with his personal return: examining his actions, confessing, correcting. That personal work is indispensable. But as we do it, the parashah reminds us of the first and primary Teshuvah of the Torah: the return of Am Israel to its land, from the farthest corners of the world — a prophecy written more than three thousand years ago, which our generation has been privileged to see with its own eyes.

THE EMPTY TENT

This week’s Haftarah, Roni Aqarah (Yeshayahu 54), presents an extraordinary image of redemption, the Geulah. The prophet speaks to Yerushalayim, which during the exile that followed the destruction of the Bet Hamiqdash had been left desolate, like a mother who suddenly finds herself alone in her tent—her home—without her children. But now, Yeshayahu tells Yerushalayim, everything is about to change! Your children are coming back, and there will be so many of them that you will need to make some renovations to the house: “Harchibi meqom aholekh”—”Enlarge the space of your tent.” In other words: pull out the stakes, move them much farther apart, expand your home, and extend its boundaries, because they are already coming…

The prophet gives her that instruction—but no one returns. The poor woman is still without her children; the city remains completely empty and desolate, and now utterly disappointed. But Yeshayahu tells her: al tachsokhi—”Do not make your tent smaller.” Do not lose hope that one day your children will return. Yeshayahu understands that after a loss, the temptation is to make yourself smaller: to shrink the tent, not to get your hopes up, not to take too many risks, not to nurture false expectations. In the name of Bore Olam, the prophet asks her to prepare a larger home and wait. Her children will return. In multitudes. But that “soon” would have to wait a very long time before becoming reality.

For centuries, we read this prophecy as a utopia, a dream beyond dreams. Jews scattered throughout the world prayed to return to Tziyon.

But eventually our tefilot were answered: once again, we have our State of Israel—the expanded tent that Yeshayahu prophesied.

Many waves of Aliyah were triggered by terrible circumstances: pogroms, persecution, antisemitism, wars. Millions of Jews arrived in Israel because they could no longer remain where they were. It was not a choice: someone or something was chasing them and pushing them—forcing them!—toward Israel.

RETURNING BY CHOICE

But there is another kind of Aliyah, with a unique merit of its own: Aliyah by choice. When a Yehudi does not flee to Israel, but deliberately moves toward Israel. When he or she voluntarily leaves behind a good and stable life because he wants Medinat Israel to become his home and the home of his children.

This is the kind of Aliyah—Aliyah motivated by conviction rather than convenience—that we experienced in my community a couple of weeks ago. A group of seven families, together with their children, made Aliyah to Israel! I know these families extremely well: they are my congregants, my students, my friends. All are successful professionals or businessmen living very comfortably in Great Neck in beautiful, comfortable homes. Their families are established here; they have excellent schools, stable jobs, and an extraordinary community life.

As good Sephardic Jews, the value and importance of family and extended family are paramount. The pain of physically separating from siblings and parents—and taking their grandchildren away from them—has been the most difficult, painful, and heartbreaking part of this entire process. But when the conviction is so strong, one feels that these enormous sacrifices are being made with the hope that, BE”H, the path is being prepared for the rest of the family to eventually come to Israel as well. And when that happens, their integration will be easier because they will already have family established there.

Paying the very high price of sacrificing comfort and familiarity, and facing the challenges of uprooting themselves, these young families from our community decided to become part of Yeshayahu’s prophecy and return to Israel’s expanded tent. They chose Raanana, a beautiful city with excellent schools for their children and first-rate healthcare. There they will begin building their future.

I believe this awakening began, ironically, after October 7, when the war began—a war that still has not ended. We witnessed a religious awakening among less religious Jews, and a renewed interest in Israel among Jews who were already religious. I never thought this would happen. Great Neck is one of the places with the highest percentages of Jewish residents anywhere in the United States—a place where, when you walk through the neighborhood, it seems that 90% of the homes have a mezuzah. It is a place where absolutely nothing is missing for a full Jewish life… (except for “Israel”).

THREE POWERFUL IDEAS THAT STAYED WITH ME

When these young families said goodbye, some of the husbands shared a Debar Torah at Seudah Shelishit and, directly or indirectly, explained what had led them to make this decision.

I will repeat some of these ideas in my own words.

MITSVOT MADE IN ISRAEL

There are 613 mitsvot in the Torah. According to the calculation of the Chafets Chayim, 271 of them can be observed today outside Israel, and an additional 26 can be fulfilled in Erets Israel—a total of 297. Many of the remaining mitsvot cannot be fulfilled today because they depend on the Bet Hamiqdash, the qorbanot, the service of the kohanim, or other conditions that no longer exist.

Those additional 26 mitsvot are not “difficult” to fulfill in Great Neck. They simply cannot be fulfilled there. A man with a small garden in Raanana can fulfill Torah mitsvot that no Jew in New York can fulfill, no matter how wealthy, observant, or learned he may be.

But there is something more—and even more important. Rashi, quoting the Sifre, explains that even in exile we must continue observing the mitsvot so that they will not be “new” to us when we return to our land. In other words, the mitsvot keep us connected to the road home:

וְשַׂמְתֶּם אֶת־דְּבָרַי — אַף לְאַחַר שֶׁתִּגְלוּ הֱיוּ מְצֻיָּנִים בַּמִּצְווֹת, הַנִּיחוּ תְּפִלִּין, עֲשׂוּ מְזוּזוֹת, כְּדֵי שֶׁלֹּא יִהְיוּ לָכֶם חֲדָשִׁים כְּשֶׁתַּחְזְרוּ. וְכֵן הוּא אוֹמֵר (ירמיהו ל”א): הַצִּיבִי לָךְ צִיֻּנִים.

“Vesamtem et debarai”—Even after you are exiled, continue to distinguish yourselves through the mitsvot: put on tefillin, place mezuzot, so that they will not seem new to you when you return.

Ramban takes this idea much further:

כִּי עִיקַּר כָּל הַמִּצְוֹת לַיּוֹשְׁבִים בְּאֶרֶץ ה׳

“For the essential fulfillment of all the mitsvot is for those who dwell in the Land of HaShem.” (Ramban, Vayiqra 18:25)

Outside Israel, we remain fully obligated to observe the mitsvot—tefillin, mezuzah, Shabbat—but their natural home, the place where they reach their fullest meaning, is Erets Israel. A Yehudi in exile is like a flower growing in a greenhouse. The forest—the natural environment of that flower—is the Land of Israel.

I want to go to Israel because it is the natural place where all the mitsvot can be fulfilled as the Almighty intended them to be fulfilled.

PRAYING OR MOVING?

Three times a day, we ask HaShem to gather us back and pray that “our eyes may behold Your return to Zion.”

But praying without doing anything is like asking HaShem for parnasah—sustenance—in Barekhenu while making no effort to work. We pray for HaShem to crown our efforts with success, not to replace them. When we say Refaenu—”Heal us”—we do not pray instead of going to the doctor. We pray while also doing everything in our power—our hishtadlut—to become healthy. If we simply pray and refuse to go to the doctor, we are responsible for what happens to us!

What, then, is the difference between praying for sustenance and health and praying for the Geulah?

Every day we ask HaShem in Teqa beshofar gadol lecherutenu: “Gather us from the four corners of the earth.” HaShem has already heard our prayers and granted our request! The gates are open, and we can return to Israel.

To continue praying for something that has already been granted to me, while doing nothing about it, is not prayer.

It is procrastination.

When Moshe stands praying to HaShem while the people of Israel are trapped between the Red Sea in front of them and the Egyptian army closing in from behind, HaShem tells him: “Ma titsaq elai? Dabber el Bene Israel veyissa’u!” —”Why are you crying out to Me? Tell the Children of Israel to move forward!” Rashi explains: this was not the time to prolong prayer. It was time to move.

There is a time to pray, and there is a time to act. At that moment, HaShem was telling Moshe: Stop praying. Move forward. Step into the sea. You do your part—and leave the rest to Me.

I want to live in Israel because HaShem has already answered our prayers. Now it is my turn to do my part—and move.

WAITING OR NOT WAITING FOR THE MASHIACH?

The great merit of living in Israel, like the merit of any other mitsvah, lies in bechirah chofshit: freedom of choice. And the more difficult the choice, the greater its merit. If someone forced me—or paid me—to go to minyan every morning, it would not be the same as choosing to go myself. And if going to minyan requires me to sacrifice some comfort because I sleep a little less, or costs me some income because I work a little less, then the merit is even greater. The greater the sacrifice involved in choosing to perform a mitsvah, the greater the merit of fulfilling it. As Ben He He teaches in Pirqe Abot (5:23): lefum tsaara agra—”According to the effort is the reward.”

I want to go to Israel by my own choice. Out of conviction. Even if it costs me. I do not want to leave because one day it may become dangerous to remain in Great Neck. I do not want to flee from where I live because I can no longer afford health insurance while healthcare there is free. Because then it would not be my choice—it would be my convenience.

Rabbi Yehudah HaLevi (1075–1141), in his famous book The Kuzari, presents a very harsh and embarrassing warning to Jews who were able, but unwilling, to return to Israel. The King of the Khazars asks the Rabbi: What happened during the Second Temple period, when the Jews prayed to God to return them to Israel, and then, when this became possible in the days of Cyrus (or Achashverosh, Y.B.), they chose to remain in exile—while, ironically, continuing to pray for God to return them to Tziyon?

The Kuzari’s response to this attitude was very severe:

“This sin—the failure to return to the Land of Israel when we had the opportunity—is what prevented the Divine plan from reaching its fulfillment during the Second Temple period. The prophet Zekhariah anticipated that all the Jews would return: ‘Sing and rejoice, daughter of Tziyon’ [for God is once again in His land, Zekhariah 2:14], and that when the majority of the Jewish people returned to Israel, the SHEKHINAH, the Divine Presence, and prophecy would return to Israel! The Yehudim were expected to return voluntarily to their land. But incredibly, this did not happen, and only some Jews returned [the poorest among them]. The great majority remained in Babylon [Persia], in a voluntary exile, because they were unwilling to separate themselves from their worldly affairs, their mansions, and their businesses.”

This cannot happen a second time.

I want to arrive in Israel before the Mashiach comes. I want to go to Israel through my own merit, by choice, and out of love for Bore Olam.

THE ONLY DEPARTURE WE SHOULD CELEBRATE

For those of us who remain here, the departure of these wonderful families and their children—52 people altogether—leaves us with mixed emotions. We will miss them, and even though our community numbers 1,200 families, their absence will be felt! But at the same time, we feel tremendous pride and joy knowing that they are now inside Yeshayahu’s tent.

It is the only kind of farewell that should be celebrated.

Because they are opening the way for those who may one day want to join them—by choice, or even by force.

To these seven families, and to all those returning to the land of our forefathers, we pray that HaShem accompany them through this enormous step; that their adjustment be easy; that they find in Israel a true home; and that their children and grandchildren grow up deeply connected to Am Israel and Erets Israel.

“Harchibi meqom aholekh.” Make more room in your tent, Israel: your children are coming home.

This is a summary of an article by Dr. Guy Bechor, published in “Gplanet,” August 13, 2026

Israel needs more soldiers. This is probably one of the most obvious conclusions of the past three years of war. Thousands of Israelis have spent an enormous portion of their lives in miluim — away from their jobs, their businesses, their studies and, above all, their families. There are soldiers who have accumulated 300, 400, even 500 days of reserve duty. It is admirable, but it is also tremendously unfair and, in the long run, unsustainable. The same families cannot be expected to keep paying the price of defending the country indefinitely.

This is the context in which a new technological revolution may take on extraordinary importance: the development of an Israeli “robot army.”

We are not talking about science fiction. During the war in Gaza and Lebanon, Tzahal already began deploying unmanned systems on a large scale: drones, remotely operated ground vehicles, small robots that enter tunnels and buildings, platforms for carrying equipment and evacuating the wounded, and, among others, the enormous D9 “Panda” bulldozer, which can clear paths and operate in dangerous areas without directly exposing its operators. The goal is very simple: whenever possible, the machine goes in first, and the soldier goes in after.

Dr. Bechor explains that Israel currently faces a shortage of roughly 12,000 conscripted soldiers, including thousands of combat troops, while the pressure keeps growing on those already serving in the reserves. Robots will not eliminate that manpower shortage. But they can become an extraordinary force multiplier: allowing fewer soldiers to carry out certain missions and, above all, keeping human beings from unnecessary exposure to danger.

Robots can already clear routes suspected of containing explosives, inspect tunnels, run patrols, transport ammunition and supplies under fire, and take part in reconnaissance operations. Every one of these tasks performed by a machine potentially means several fewer soldiers exposed to the enemy — and more personnel available for the missions that truly require human intelligence, judgment, and decision-making.

The next step will be far more ambitious. Tzahal’s new program calls for the systematic integration of robotics and artificial intelligence across the ground, air, and naval forces. In the near future, groups of robots and drones will be able to share information with one another, recognize obstacles, and operate in coordination, while human beings retain control of the fundamental decisions.

But there is an essential caveat. Technology can never replace the human being. October 7 proved that cameras, sensors, and sophisticated electronic systems are of little use when interpretation, vigilance, or decision-making fail. It must be acknowledged that even a robotic army probably would not have completely prevented the invasion from Gaza. Robots can detect threats faster and save lives, but they cannot replace human leadership and responsibility.

For Israel, then, this revolution is not about replacing our soldiers. It is about protecting them, multiplying their capabilities, and allowing many of them to finally return sooner to their jobs, their wives, their children, and their homes.

נְקֹ֗ם נִקְמַת֙ בְּנֵ֣י יִשְׂרָאֵ֔ל מֵאֵ֖ת הַמִּדְיָנִ֑ים אַחַ֖ר תֵּאָסֵ֥ף אֶל־עַמֶּֽיךָ׃

HaShem tells Moshe: “Lead the battle of the children of Israel against the Midianites; afterward, you will be gathered to [the souls of] your people.” (Bamidbar 31:2)

MISSION AND SACRIFICE

In this week’s parasha, Moshe Rabenu teaches us a great lesson: how to hold two opposite feelings at once and let them complete each other.

On one side, HaShem tells him, “Go, fight the Midianites, and afterward you will be gathered to your people.” That is, you will die. This war is your last mission. Moshe understands. He knows his body will return to the dust, and his soul will join his ancestors. He does not resist. He does not bargain. He accepts his own mortality with humility.

On the other side, Moshe knows he is irreplaceable as a leader. He does not say to HaShem: give this mission to Yehoshua; I am tired; let someone else do it. Moshe knows his worth. He knows no one can take his place. But he feels no vanity. He takes the responsibility on himself, to the last day.

In Moshe, these two opposite ideas—humility and self-worth—complete each other.

BET VAAD LECHOL CHAI

Yesterday, Thursday, I visited Har Hamenuchot, the largest Jewish cemetery in Yerushalayim. It sits in Givat Shaul. It covers about 58 hectares—roughly 80 soccer fields. More than 200,000 graves. Some of the greatest rabbis of recent generations rest there: Rabbi Chayim Yosef David Azulai; Rabbi Mordekhai Eliyahu; Rabbi Shalom Messas; Rabbi Yaakob Yosef, and many others.

I have to confess something. I generally do not visit cemeteries. I follow the opinion of Maimonides, who writes that one should not frequent graves (Hilkhot Ebel 4:4). And in that same place he teaches that what remembers the tzadikim is not the text carved in stone. It is their teachings. Their words and their deeds, when we recall them, are their true monument. For me, the best way to honor the memory of our Chakhamim is exactly what Maimonides says: to read, study, and teach their ideas.

I had the zekhut of writing the biographies and ideas of more than 120 “forgotten” Sephardic Chakhamim (here). I published two books about them, which I called Forgotten Giants. Every time I write about one of these rabbis, I remember what Chazal said about a verse in Shir haShirim: “dobeb sifte yeshenim“—when you repeat, when you teach, the words of a rabbi who has died, “his lips move in the grave” (Yebamot 97a). To bring back his memory is an act of techiyat hametim. From this angle, visiting the books of the Chakhamim does more to elevate their memory than visiting their graves.

THE SIGN THAT MAKES YOU THINK

I went to Har Hamenuchot thinking about our patriarchs. Abraham bought the Meara of Makhpela in Hebron in his own lifetime (Bereshit 23). He negotiated, he paid, and he secured his place and Sara’s. He did not wait. He did not leave the task to his children. Thinking about the end is not morbid. It is part of living with clear eyes, and a sign of humility before your own mortality.

When I reached the cemetery, a small sign made me stop and think. It was very simple.

It quotes two famous texts.

The first, a line from the Mishna: “Bishvili nibra haolam” — “The world was created for me” (Sanhedrin 4:5).

The second, the words of Abraham Abinu: “Veanokhi afar vaefer” — “I am only dust and ashes” (Bereshit 18:27).

Two opposite ideas. But the wisdom lies in holding both.

Start with the second, which speaks of our smallness. We are atoms. Dust returning to the earth. The more we learn about the universe, the smaller we look. In space, our whole planet is only a pale blue dot, as Carl Sagan put it. In July 1994, the comet Shoemaker-Levy 9 struck Jupiter and destroyed a surface larger than the entire Earth. It was almost routine, a small event in our small solar system—and it leaves you thinking and trembling about our cosmic fragility. We are small in space and brief in time. An illusion of no more than 120 years. Moshe Rabenu knew his return to the dust was certain, and that kept him humble. But he also knew his mission, which mattered more than his survival.

The first idea is the opposite: “the world was created for me.” At first it sounds narcissistic. But it is not. The Mishna teaches us to see ourselves as central to the Creator’s plans. Like The Truman Show, where every camera is fixed on one person. It is the way the Chakhamim teach us to see ourselves — to grasp a unique and central role in the Creator’s plans, and to realize our own significance and potential.

THE TWO NOTES INSIDE YOUR POCKETS

Rab Simcha Bunim taught that you must carry these two ideas like two notes, one in each pocket, all your life. In one pocket: “The world was created for me.” In the other: “I am dust and ashes.” Both notes are true. Wisdom is knowing which to read and when.

When you feel low, crushed by life, or depressed. Reach into the first pocket and repeat to yourself, “I was created with unique talents, and I must not waste them. Not one day should pass without putting them to use: for Am Israel, to draw closer to the Creator, and to have a good effect on others.”

When you feel worthless or forgotten, remember this: the world was created for you. Only you can do things no other human being can do.

And when you start to feel superior to others, reach for the second note. Dust and ashes. As that old song I listened to as a young man put it, about how fleeting life is: “All we are is dust in the wind.” Dust, carried off by the wind. Smallness and impermanence. The 120 years fly by.

Neither truth is enough on its own. Humility without a sense of purpose sinks you. A sense of purpose—knowing your own worth—without humility makes you arrogant. The wisdom is knowing which note to pull from which pocket in each moment.

And maybe that is why the sign stands right there, at the entrance to the cemetery. Because it is the one place where both notes open at the same time. Every grave declares “afar vaefer”: dust that returned to dust. But every grave is also a witness to “bishvili nibra haolam”: here rests a human being who was unique, with divine gifts, who made a difference in the world.